Wow. This is the first time I've been full-time at a new school in eleven years. One thing's for certain: It's a lot different than starting at Berkeley in '91.

On nearly every axis things are different. At Berkeley I lived in the dorms, surrounded by other freshmen; here I live alone in a quiet neighborhood (across the street from the aforementioned cemetery). Before I came in not knowing what I wanted to do with my life; this time around I'm tightly focused: I know exactly what I want to learn and I have a clear idea of how I want to apply those skills when I finish. Back then I took a lingering academic dalliance that would, over the course of a decade, traverse between academia and industry no less than eight times; this time it's a straight 12-month shot, from Yahoo to my Masters in HCI, back to industry.

I also realize how different a person I am. Always the first to jump to the proverbial wall (you know, the one coated with flowers), shy around strangers while trying so hard to fit in -- a juxtaposition that leads invariably to a palpable social awkwardness far worse than shyness: When you're shy, people overlook you. When you're socially inept, people avoid you.

Luckily 18 year-olds are different than the twentysomethings (and thirtysomethings) in grad school, not to mention our shared interests and complimentary backgrounds.

It turns out that we have a huge leg up on last year's Masters students in that most of us got to know each other before classes, and being a social bunch, we had gatherings pretty much every night the week before classes, so now most of us already know a lot about each other, and hang out together, in sharp contrast with last year, where one of the Masters students told me they spent the whole first semester getting to know each other, and even then they didn't really know everyone. We already feel like a team.

So, first day of classes! More pragmatic and slightly less stressful than Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon condones (or, at least tolerates) 'shopping' for classes: signing up for more classes than you could realistically take, to find the ones you like in the first week or two, then drop the others. This is a nice change from Berkeley where you can't sign up for more than max units, so you have to crash all the classes you want/need. The difference is subtle, and probably all in the student's mind, the distinction between trying to crash into a class and trying to stay in a class, but at least it postpones the despair for a few weeks.

Of course, as a grad student the situation is different. I'm taking one or possibly two classes that are taught at the undergrad level, and are heavily impacted, but as a grad student in the department that offers the class, I got an email today saying I'd been enrolled in the class even though I was #21 on the wait list. It's not as unfair as it sounds, considering that undergrads sign up for Fall classes in April, and incoming grad students sign up in July, so naturally allowances have to be made for impacted courses. Still, it's nice.

Oh, the wireless network: It's great. Every foot of lawn, every lounge, classroom, hallway and broom closet is blanketed in 802.11 goodness. I keep my laptop with me as a matter of course now, pulling it out whenever I'm taking a break on campus, eating lunch, or otherwise want to check in on the ether-world which, month-by-month is where more of my work and communication takes place. It's a wonderful thing to have my distal friends so close, even when they're so far.

I'm making a lot of new friends here, too. Despite the pressure-cooker drive to find new people to share experiences with, I'm making some good friends, and a lot of acquaintances. I still feel odd naming names, since I'm made more aware daily of how many of my costudents read this, but I'm sure I'll feel more comfortable with it as we all get to know each other better.

As soon as I finalize my class load, probably by the end of the week, I'll post the list, and describe each one. You long-timers probably remember the left-hand nav module listing the classes I'm in. Well, I'll bring it back, and I'll try to open it up wider, writing all my assignments in HTML so I can share my voyage of discovery with you.

Well, that's probably it for the moment. I'm struggling to get DSL at home so I don't have to plug and unplug dialup whenever I want to check email or movie times. I also need cable, and a bank account, all of which beg the question "why are you blogging until 6pm when you have domestic things to sort out?" Well, you guys come first.

The apartment's really shaping up, and now that I have a hammer I can finish making my space up just the way I want it. Once I do, I'll take 'after' pictures to go along with the 'before' pics I took last June when I signed the lease.

Oh! And I have a new cellphone number! Okay, call me just too clever, but if you know my old Berkeley home # and want my new Pittsburgh cell #, type the Berkeley home # here (no spaces , parentheses, or dashes):

and click .